He’d show up to briefings without his flight computer. He’d confuse QNH and QFE on mock exams. Once, he calculated V1 for a wet runway… using dry runway tables. Marta pulled him aside after that one.
Captain Marta Reyes was known for two things at European Flight Training: a 98% first-time pass rate for her ATPL theory students, and her zero-tolerance policy for “airhead mistakes.” Not the kind where you forget your lunch—the kind that kills. airhead atpl
So she gave him a challenge.
“Leo,” she said, “ATPL isn’t about knowing everything. It’s about not making the one stupid mistake that undoes the other 99 right answers. You are clever. But clever doesn’t save you from being an airhead. Discipline does.” He’d show up to briefings without his flight computer
The Airhead’s First ATPL Mock Exam